The Bargain
by Sophia Night
Summary: A Nightmare on Elm Street 2010 fan fiction inspired by the album Ceremonials, disc 1, by Florence and the Machine. Partly AU. This story is about the forces of Fire and Water - in their widest senses.
1. 1st encounter

**The Bargain**

A _Nightmare on Elm Street_ (2010) fan fiction inspired by the album _Ceremonials_ (disc 1) by Florence + the Machine. Partly AU. Because there are no genuinely good _Nightmare_ fan fics out there. And because I like silent and ugly men...

_Disclaimer_: I do not own the overall concept of the story, the beautiful 'Hey little Nancy'-scene or the character of Freddy Krueger (though I wish I would!). Nancy is based on the Nancy of the 2010 movie, but older and with more guts. The rest of the characters are my own.

**To the Celtic fire god Lugh**

**for his late summer heat and passion.**

**1****st**** encounter**

"Hey, little Nancy…"

She whipped around and stared right into his face in the pale moonlight. He stepped closer as she backed against the wall of her old school.

"All grown up…"

His warm breath hit her cheek as he leaned closer, and the outlines of his distorted face seemed to play hide and seek in the shadow of his hat. She turned her face away with disgust.

"Do you remember me? You must. You're my number one. You're my… little Nancy."

The touch of his moist and warm tongue against her cheek as it moved from her jaw to her ear made her shiver, and she closed her eyes firmly.

A gush of early childhood memories rushed through her. Yes, she remembered him. She remembered him in between glimpses of sunshine and laughter. Between patches of watercolour and the smell of hot chocolate. And in forgotten tangles of hidden secrets.

She forced her eyes open and looked him straight in the eyes.

"I remember you. Then you weren't this handsome, though."

You could have sliced through her sarcasm with a butter knife. He let out a short guttural laughter, took her fist in his clawed hand and stuck his nose into her hair to sniff her out.

"You smell different… all grown up."

"I've set the alarm."

"Yes, you did. In your dream."


	2. Interlude 1

**Interlude**

She gasped sharply and sat up-right in her bed. The street-lights illuminated the floor of her dark childhood chamber, the assorted teddy bears and other memorabilia which her mother had kept after she herself had moved out.

She lit the bedside lamp and moved her shaking fingers through her long dark hair. She was an experienced Dream Traveller, but it had been silly of her to consider it a banality when Colin had asked her to take on this case. She had thought it easy, because it involved her old Springwood neighbourhood and childhood friends whom she knew like the back of her hand. But now she could see that she had got more than she had bargained for.

Of course, her parents didn't know the reason for her sudden visit. They thought it was the recent split with her boyfriend that was driving her to move back for a couple of months. They had always known that she had abilities which were far from common, but they had no idea that she was actually making money on fixing people's dreams – from the inside.

Also, they didn't know that a collective nightmare was haunting some of the young people from the neighbourhood in the form of a madman with a burnt face and a knife-encrusted glove, and that this nightmare was the real and only reason their daughter had returned to this God-forsaken place. As far as she had understood from Colin's incoherent ramblings on the phone, the nightmares had started only a month ago, possibly triggered by a series of news on child abuse in the local media, and were dreamt of by only seven persons between the ages of 23 and 25, now including Nancy herself. The course of the dreams varied from person to person, but they all included sequences of the same man in pursuit of the dreamer. This far, it had seemed like a pretty straightforward nightmare job, and Nancy had immediately accepted the case – partly to get to see Colin again who had been her high school sweetheart. Two weeks ago, however, the case had taken a sudden turn when one of her old classmates, Steven, had cut his own throat with a bread knife – apparently while fighting with someone who tried to kill him in his sleep. He was the first one to die of 'unknown causes', followed by Monica and Jason…

She swung her legs down from the bed and buried her toes in the fluffy pink carpet. Now, there were only few things which could seriously scare Nancy, and a stupid nightmare ghoul was not one of them. She told herself. After all, she had encountered dozens of them – of all shapes and sizes – and she wouldn't let one this ordinary put her off.

However, the man with the claws had seemed unnaturally real and disturbingly familiar. In spite of his distorted face, she had recognized him in her dream, but now she was groping around desperately in her mind to recall him. He had evoked a mixed feeling of complicity, secrecy and understated danger, which had been lying dormant in her for many years, but she couldn't quite put a finger on where it came from.

She made a mental note on getting an appointment with her shrink when all this was over.


	3. 2nd encounter

**2****nd**** encounter**

Ironically, the only thought racing through her head was: _This isn't the way I'm supposed to meet my best friend after six years of separation_, when in reality she should have been thinking: _How do I get out of this dream alive?_

The steam generated by the pipes made the air inside the corridor almost intolerably hot, and the fire inside the furnaces in the far-end chamber cast dancing red lights on the floors and walls of the cellar. The flames made an infernal sound as their heat was spiralled upwards, heating the water in the boilers, which in turn was sucked into circulation in the endless pipes running along the corridor.

Nancy licked the salty sweat from her upper lip and narrowed her eyes to sharpen her vision in the damp air. Suddenly, she felt sick and dehydrated.

In the shadows of the farthest end of the corridor, the slender figure of Jessie was standing hunched and shaking under his inspection. Her white gown was torn and dirty, and long slashes ran across her bruised arms, dripping blood onto the concrete floor. He was studying her like an artist would study an unfinished sculpture, slowly pacing around her. As he raised his clawed hand, Jessie let out an almost inaudible whimper. Her moist eyes turned pleadingly towards Nancy.

_Help me!_

Without considering any plan B, Nancy stepped out of the shadows of the corridor.

"Stop…"

Her voice had trembled more than she had intended, and she pulled herself together mentally.

"Stop it!"

Generally, it wasn't recommended to interfere directly with another person's dream. Especially, if it was a nightmare. It could very well be mentally damaging – or even fatal – for both the dreamer and the Dream Traveller. And if you did interfere, then you should always have a backup plan. So, at least, Nancy had been taught by her mentor. But at the moment, all she had was her will to free Jessie and a determination to hide her own terror.

He lowered his clawed hand and turned slowly towards her. Jessie collapsed onto the floor with a sob, her trembling legs finally giving up on supporting her.

"Nancy… What a pleasant surprise."

The light of the furnaces illuminated his face, making Nancy gasp involuntarily. The skin appeared to be pulled tightly over a small but delicately shaped skull with marked cheekbones. It was strewn with severe burn marks and deep wounds which seemed barely healed. Around the small watery eyes, the skin was molten, giving his marred features a cat-like expression, and the left cheek was completely hollowed out, only some strings of burnt skin and flesh covering the teeth inside. His distorted and swollen lips twitched in a half-smile. He was not entirely displeased by her interrupting his play.

"Let her go!"

He looked at her with mild interest, tilting his head with a maniacal playfulness and honing the knives of his glove against each other. She looked from him to her friend.

"Jessie, are you alright?"

Quickly, he grabbed the blonde hair of the screaming Jessie with his left hand and dragged her closer on her bleeding knees. Squatting down beside her, he started caressing her chin with his claws.

"Oh, she's alright. Aren't you, Jessie?" he rasped into her ear while looking Nancy in the eyes.

"Get away from her, you creep!"

A crude laughter issued from his throat, echoing down the length of the corridor and disappearing into the darkness.

"Come and play with someone who's your equal!" she spat without thinking.

Finally, her words succeeded in triggering him. His laughter ceased as abruptly as it had started, turning into a sneer instead. He stood up and shoving a whimpering Jessie aside, he started to walk towards Nancy, flexing his gloved hand.

She backed away into the shadows. She didn't know how long the corridor was, or if she would be able to find a weapon to fight with. She knew, however, that she had to find a way to wake up, or she would die.

As he quickened his pace, a tinkling noise reached her ear through the roar of the furnaces. Her alarm clock.

_Wake up_, she thought desperately, still backing into the unknown depths of the dark corridor. His shadowy figure, silhouetted against the firelight from the heating chamber, was closing in on her menacingly.

_Wake up, it's just a dream!_

Her heal caught a crack in the concrete floor, and her speed gave her the last push out of balance.

She fell…


	4. Interlude 2

**Interlude**

"Coffee?"

"What? No. Tea, please."

In spite of its dark lines and deep furrows, Colin's face with its square-cut shape, blonde hair and dreamy green eyes was still as handsome as she remembered it.

"Coffee for me. Black. No sugar," he said, his voice struggling to hide his fatigue.

The waitress went away with pursed lips. The diner was stuffed with people having their afternoon coffees.

Nancy inspected Colin more carefully now than when they had met in the park earlier. His eyelids were swollen and heavy, his breathing quick and shallow. He had obviously been keeping himself awake for too long.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

"You've got no idea, what it's like being me," he snapped.

_Touchiness: a sure sign of insomnia_, she thought. She leaned back and looked out of the window to give him time to calm down. What had she seen in Colin – apart from his big green eyes? At the moment, she had no idea. Like all other men she had known, he was sensitive to criticism and impervious to reason.

She sighed.

She needed someone who was rough, someone who could stand his ground, someone who could seduce her. And she had been seeking him restlessly since… well, ever since she could remember.

"I'm not going to sleep after what happened to Jessie!"

"Hm?" She slipped back into reality and leaned closer to him across the table, "Look: I'll be there for you like I was there for Jessie. He won't be able to hurt you."

The waitress placed two steaming cups in front of them with a sour expression and hurried away. Colin shook his head and looked into his coffee.

"You don't understand. He's so _real_, so familiar. I don't want to die," he sobbed, finally breaking down.

Nancy opened her mouth to say something comforting, but couldn't think of anything and closed it again silently like a fish gasping for water. For a Dream Traveller, people's boogiemen were usually harmless, even ridiculous, but this madman seemed somehow to be more dangerous than the rest. She couldn't really argue against three funerals in two weeks.

"Most of the time, it's a dull job," she had been told by her mentor, "but be prepared to see things you would wish you hadn't seen."

Of course she had forgotten all about his warning in her sheer excitement that she had found someone who was able to enter and manipulate dreams like she herself. This had been five years ago, just a couple of months after she had started studying psychology. Old professor Brown had spotted her unusual timidity in no time and had come up to her after one of his lectures on Jungian archetypes.

"You have a way with dreams, don't you?" he had asked straightforwardly, looking solemnly into her eyes from underneath his bushy grey eyebrows.

That was the moment her journey towards becoming a Dream Traveller had begun. From that moment, she could finally face a side of herself that she had been ashamed of since she had been a child.

"Most boogiemen contact us because they want something from us…" she began, trying to sound more professional and calm than she felt.

"Yes, he wants us to die, that's what he bloody wants!"

The increasing panic in Colin's voice made the couple at the nearest table turn towards them with curiosity.

"Each of us must be specially connected to him", Nancy continued, starting to scribble names on a napkin, "we just have to find out how."

Colin rubbed his sleepy eyes with a trembling hand.

"Before they died, Monica and Steven told me he used to appear to them in our old school," he said, now a bit calmer, "I don't know about Jason – he used to keep things pretty much to himself – but to me, Jessie and Val, he appears only in this awfully hot cellar with all these blazing furnaces."

Nancy sipped her tea and nodded. Their old school… Why couldn't she remember his name? Why couldn't she remember who he was? It had all been so clear in that first dream.

It had all been so obvious.


	5. 3rd encounter

**3****rd**** encounter**

The air was hot and sultry, the sun baking mercilessly the already tortured dry lawn. A stifling breeze crept across the playground, setting the rusty swings in motion and blowing a couple of dirty plastic bags into a corner of the school.

She squinted her eyes at the sky and ran a sweaty palm across her forehead. Huge grey clouds were now gathering with unnatural speed above the square buildings, blocking out the sunshine.

_He's here_, she thought, looking around, _somewhere_.

In the distance, there was a sound of children playing and laughing, but nobody was in sight. The end of an old seesaw tipped to the ground with a creak in the increasing wind. There was a sudden thunder in the sky, and the air assumed a taste of iron in Nancy's mouth.

A door flanked by two dark windows was closed and reopened by the gusts. Nancy stepped quickly towards it, seeking refuge from the approaching storm. She was pretty sure it hadn't been there a second ago. She slammed it firmly behind her.

A concrete corridor stretched monotonously in front of her, dimly lit by the warm light of fires somewhere in the belly of a couple of side chambers. There were no windows, only endless rows of pipes running along the walls and the ceiling.

_ This is it…_

She passed the first chamber, the heat of the roaring furnaces inside hitting her forcefully in the face. The beating sound of a drum made her look over her shoulder, but there was nothing to see. While she was creeping slowly along the pipes, the sound grew louder. A flicker of shadows across the light in the second chamber made her halt. She inhaled deeply, realizing that the drumming noise was the sound of her own heart beating.

_This is the place…_

Colin was dangling in a chain near one of the blazing furnaces, a mix of sweat and blood dripping from his nose onto the floor. He was hoisted by his arms which were pulled up in an unnatural angle behind his back. His body was shaking uncontrollably, trying to support his weight on his toes which were just able to reach the ground. Pain and fear were playing tag across his face.

He lifted his head as Nancy stepped closer, widening his eyes warningly.

"Watch out… he's here…" he breathed, struggling to pass the words over his lips.

A figure disentangled itself from the deep shadows in the corner of the cellar, stepping up behind Nancy.

"Right behind you."

Nancy spun around with a gasp. A row of damaged yellowish teeth reflected the light of the fires in a horrible grin from underneath the brim of an old and battered fedora. The figure was barely an inch taller than her. His broad shoulders were accentuated by the green and red stripes of his tattered sweater, and a scraping sound of metal told her that he was wearing his knife-encrusted glove behind his back.

"I was just chatting with your boyfriend here," he rasped, stepping next to Colin and giving him a light push, "he told me you'd be coming around."

Colin fought frantically to regain his balance.

"He's not my boyfriend," she said, trying to keep her voice calm and composed.

"Not so?" he asked, grabbing Colin by the throat, "then you won't mind me doing this…"

He pressed the side of Colin's face against the blazing furnace with a strong push. A sizzling sound of live flesh on hot metal filled the room, and Colin's agonized howl cut through the noise of the furnaces like a dagger.

"What do you want?!" she screamed, forgetting all about keeping up her composed attitude.

The beat of her heart echoed in her ears as he let go of Colin and turned towards her with a grave expression in his watery eyes. He wasn't playing anymore.

There had been a small pond in their schoolyard. With goldfish. It had been the most wonderful goldfish in the world, and she had been occupied by watching them during each and every break in those first months. They had been her only friends, the only creatures she could and wanted to talk to. They had been swimming effortlessly through the green-blue water, luring her to join them, and the shimmer of the surface had seemed to beckon her closer, promising to envelope her mind and memory in eternal oblivion.

_It's me…_

"It's me you want, isn't it?" she whispered, "I'm the one you want…"

There was a flash of light in his eyes, but he didn't move. Only the furious heaving and sinking of his striped chest showed the emotional tempest inside.

A strong hand had grabbed her by the back of her neck, pulling her towards the surface. _Why?_ she had thought, looking up into the light, _it's so peaceful down here._ The screams and sobs of the other children had broken upon her as she had broken the surface of the pond. He had cradled her in his arms like a baby, soaking his red-and-green-striped sweater. In the classroom, he had been talking soothingly, stroking her small hands, while a bunch of busy nurses and confused teachers had been bustling around them with towels, blankets and hot teapots. Then, her parents had arrived. It had been the first and only time she had seen her mother in tears. She had caught his bright blue eyes among the anxious adult faces, and he had been looking composedly into hers – as if they had had a mutual recognition.

_You should've let the water take me._

After all these years, she was looking into his eyes again. Now, she understood. He wanted her. He wanted her in exchange for her friends. Slowly, she felt fury, then powerlessness rise inside her, and the heat in the cellar seemed suddenly exceedingly real and suffocating. A bargain must be made.

"Take me. I'm your number one, remember?"

"NO! Nancy, no…!"

Colin was rattling his chains, nearly losing his balance again.

"Shut up!" they exclaimed simultaneously, turning on him.

A sceptical glance shot towards her from the molten eyes underneath the fedora. Then it turned into mild amusement. Apparently, they still had their small moments of mutual understanding.

It was as if her pockets were filled to the brim with stones, and she was sinking fast and deep under a roaring wave. This time, though, no one would save her. She would let the water take her.

"I'm the one that you want, isn't it? Then take me, but leave the others alone – all of them."

He stepped up to her, searching her look.

"Are you sure?" he whispered softly, tracing a burnt finger along the lines of her jaw and biting his lips, "I can be a bit… fierce, you know."

She pulled away from his touch.

"I'm yours. But promise me…"

He grabbed her throat with a sudden hiss, bringing her to her knees. Colin started to whimper in the background.

"I don't think you're in a position to negotiate. Or would you have it any other way – my little Nancy?"


	6. Interlude 3

**Interlude**

The ducks were nipping eagerly at the bread she had tossed into the water, bustling with each other to get the biggest pieces. She leaned her back against the bench, closed her eyes and tilted her head to drink in the last heat of the late summer sun. It felt good to be alone. Just her, the ducks and the water. She wondered how long it would last.

It was two weeks since she had made the bargain. With him. Since that night, he hadn't shown up in her dreams at all, nor in the dreams of her friends. But she knew it was only a matter of time. This was the silence before a terrible storm.

"You're crazy," Colin had said resignedly, rubbing his cheek where a big red spot was betraying his rendezvous with the hot furnace the preceding night, "you're absolutely out of your mind."

"It's my job to keep you safe," she had responded matter-of-factly, "you should know. You hired me."

"I didn't hire you to get killed!"

"I'm doing my best to avoid it. Trust me."

She had cast him a casual smile to show that she had the whole situation under control. But the truth was that she had felt more crestfallen than ever before.

"I don't want you to get hurt, that's all," he had mumbled.

She had sent him an inquisitive glance, but he had looked away hurriedly, flexing his sore shoulders.

"I'm not going to discuss my methods," she had said, rising from the cafeteria table where they had been sitting. _Mostly because I'm not sure if I even have one_, she had added in her thoughts, exhaling heavily.

"I'm sorry, Colin, I have to go now."

She opened her eyes and looked across the lake. A young couple were holding hands while walking along the shore.

He used to hold her hand. He used to hold it gently, his warm and somewhat rough palm scratching against her soft child's skin. He used to hold her hand with a certain passion and sense of secrecy. It had all started a couple of days after the accident at the pond. She had been lonely and sad, shun as she had been by her schoolmates, and he had made her some hot chocolate to cure the last of her cold. They had painted and played, they had told each other tales, they had explored the secret passages and cellars of the school. They had laughed and had felt that they would never have to be lonely and afraid again.

She rose and headed towards the local library. It had to be open by now.

The hall was empty except for a couple of librarians wrestling with some big volumes at one of the shelves. In spite of its small size, the outline of the room always made Nancy feel as if she was entering a boundless labyrinth.

"Can I help you?"

Nancy turned to the friendly voice at the counter. Jessie's smiling face faded instantly as she recognized her old friend, all colour draining from her cheeks as if by magic. Since their last meeting in that horrible nightmare, Jessie had refused to talk to her.

"Hey, Jessie…"

Jessie gazed at her hands with unease, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

"How's it going? I haven't heard from you since…"

"I don't want to talk about it," Jessie snapped, meeting Nancy's gaze with fear in her eyes, "what do you want?"

Nancy gaped. She hadn't meant to offend or scare her.

"I've just come to do some research," she said calmly, deciding not to ripple more emotions than necessary, "I'd like to see the local papers 15-20 years back."

Jessie showed her the way to the PCs and left her hastily without a word. The silence in this corner of the library was profound.

Nancy sat down and started to scrawl through endless numbers of articles. The database went back at least 50 years, and even though she made an advanced search for 'Springwood, school, 1989-1994' there were still thousands of headlines to be looked through. What was she looking for? Events? People? She had no idea, but she had a feeling that she would know when she found it.

'Headmistress at Badham School in Springwood resigns'

That was her old school.

'Springwood High School wins prestigious award' with a picture of a rather self-satisfied headmaster.

'Springwood in chock: Factory near Badham School burned to the ground'

She remembered that day. She had been crying for weeks afterwards without knowing why.

She scrawled down.

'Springwood school celebrates 10-year anniversary'

'Near-fatal accident at Badham School in Springwood"

Half of the page was occupied by a black-and-white photograph of a serious-looking Mrs. Whitney, headmistress, standing on the grounds of the school with the grey buildings to the left and a patch of lawn to the right. Nancy could feel her heart skip a beat. In the background of the picture, a man was shovelling earth into a hole in the ground. He was wearing a fedora.

She skimmed the article; it was about her falling into the school pond. _Good for the media, not so good for the image of the school_, she thought. There was no mention of him or how he had rescued her. She zoomed in on the photo, but it was impossible to see his face properly; the resolution was too coarse. But she was positive that it was him – his proportions, his pose, the way he tilted his head... She would never be able to mistake him for someone else.

She scrawled down frantically, searching for more.

'Charity school play in Springwood is a huge success'

Another article about her old school, this time from the year before she started at Badham. One of the pictures showed a theatre hall full of people. The other was a stage shot of the play itself. It was performed by some of the older children with the smaller classes in supporting roles. All were dressed in period costumes, one of them wearing the signature beard of Lincoln.

Nancy's eyes were immediately drawn to the lower left corner, where a fair-haired man in a striped t-shirt was sitting hunched with his back to the camera. He was directing one of the spotlights towards the little Lincoln. She zoomed in, but again the photo was too blurred. There was no doubt, though, his small and slim figure was giving him away.

Once more, she searched the text for references, but found none. Who was he? A teacher? Then he wouldn't have been the one filling in the pond. A caretaker, more likely… She wished that she would remember more clearly, but somehow the memories kept eluding her. The harder she thought about them, the more distant they became.

If only she could figure out the connection; if only she knew _her own_ connection to him. Suddenly, she felt hopelessly exhausted. Somehow, she had a premonition that shedding light on this mystery would not become her well. Did she really want to know the truth?

Nancy scrawled down again, but found nothing more. Then she searched for other years, but no relevant articles or pictures showed up. She tried with 'caretaker, Badham school' and got a blank page.

Her head started to ache, and she rested her forehead against the cool table, letting out a sigh of frustration. Somewhere behind the shelves, the sound of children playing and singing broke the silence of the library.

If only she could remember his name…


	7. 4th encounter

**4****th**** encounter**

She was lying face down in the mud, heavy and cold rain splashing on the ground around her. The sound of children playing and laughing seemed to grow louder, and a fierce wind was tearing at the naked branches of the surrounding trees.

Nancy lifted her head and looked around. The woods were engulfed in a dim twilight, the tree trunks and branches dark silhouettes against a lead-coloured sky. Small black shadows were moving quickly among the trees, their voices twisted and momentarily carried away by the strong gusts of wind. Children.

_What do you want from me?_ she thought, rising to her feet and struggling to see clearly in the dim light.

Her hair and clothes were drenched with rain, her skirt and sweater clinging to her damp skin. The cold air made her shiver, and she discovered that she wasn't wearing any shoes. Wiping her face with the sleeve of her sweater, she looked around to find her bearings. The forest seemed vast and hostile.

She took a few steps towards the playing children. They retreated into the darkness of the woods as if they were luring her towards something. One of the girls in a white dress looked her in the eyes and laughed before turning on her heels and running to join the others.

"Jessie?"

Nancy quickened her pace. Now, she seemed to recognize a few of them. There was Monica, Jason and Colin… and little Benjie who had cut his wrists at a youth asylum some years earlier.

As she moved through the rain and the mist, the forest started to clear, and some of the trees were replaced by lampposts. Their light was pale and flimsy in the pouring rain as they illuminated the sidewalk beneath. In stead of the woods, a desolate and abandoned factory building was rising towards the grey sky, taunting and mocking it with its monstrous shape. The children and their laughter were gone.

A group of people were standing in a circle around a fire, throwing photographs and pieces of paper into the flames. Behind them, the dark windows of the factory reflected the warm light of the fire. Or was the building consumed by real flames from the inside?

One of the men put an arm around one of the women. Their faces were lit up by the bright light of the fire. She was sobbing silently and reservedly like someone who had forgotten how to cry.

"Mom? Dad?"

"Do you like what you see?"

She moved her wet hair out of her face with a wave of the hand and turned towards the rasping voice. He was standing right beside her, looking at the scene. She hadn't noticed his arrival. The brim of his hat shaded him from the dim light of the nearest lamppost and the distant flames. In the shadows, his face seemed ghostly white and serious. Small drops of rain were dripping from the fedora onto his shoulders where the woollen fabric of the striped sweater was sucking them up greedily. The air was filled with the sound of silently honing knives.

A rush of panic ran through her, but she knew that it would be futile to run away. This was his world.

She shivered in the chill rain and looked at him.

"I don't understand…" she ventured, her voice breaking off with cold and fear.

He averted his eyes from the group and turned his face towards her, his jaw slackening slightly. He was contemplating her.

"This is the end," he said, stepping up to her and staring right into her eyes, "this was how it ended."

She stared back at him with an increasing sense of desperation. The dark emptiness of his eyes threatened to engulf her. There was a bottomless abyss inside them, and she was falling into it.

"No!"

She shook her head disbelievingly and backed away up against a large tree trunk. He followed her quickly, pressing her against the uneven bark. She wanted to scream for help, but all she could manage was a faint gasp. The group of parents around the fire didn't seem to have noticed anything.

He leaned close to her, growling lowly. His breath hit her neck warmly through the pouring rain, and a moist smell which reminded her of mouldering timber and cracking concrete walls enveloped them both. His clawed hand barred her escape route towards the woods.

"I have always loved you," he whispered, slipping his left hand up the inside of her thighs.

"Don't touch me!" she sneered.

Gathering all her strength, she pushed him away and ran. The ground was soft and slippery as if the earth itself was working against her. The fire and the group by the building were gone; only the flames inside the windows were still there, their blazing light growing ever stronger. Her bare feet sank into the wet soil, and she lost her balance before she could reach the solid ground of the sidewalk. As she fell, the heat of the fire inside the factory shattered the fragile windows, spreading splinters of glass in all directions.

"Do you think you can run away from me?"

His hand grabbed her hair with a forceful grip, dragging her up from the ground. She screamed and struggled to free herself, but he was stronger than her. Somewhere behind her agony, she could feel anger building up inside her, and she clenched her fist. Who did he think he was, attacking her like this?!

"I hate you!" she screamed, hitting him hard in the face.

He let go of her immediately, and she tumbled back onto the muddy ground, snorting and panting with exhaustion. She looked up, ready to hit him again with her hurting fist. He stood still with legs apart and a hand gliding thoughtfully over his cheek. Then, his marred lips curled into a mocking smile as he tore a bleeding piece of skin off his face. The fire from the factory flashed insanely in his moist eyes.

"No, you don't," he growled, grabbing her hair again.

This time, he didn't let himself be put off by her blows and kicks. She could see anger and madness tightening all the muscles in his face into one firm expression of will, as he jerked her into a standing position.

"You are mine!" he spat.

The knives of his glove gleamed sharply in the light of the fire, as he lifted his hand for a blow. Her screams drowned in gasps.

_This is the end._

She shot her eyes and cowered, lifting her arms in order to ward off the inevitable blow. But it was too late. The noise of the knives cutting through the rainy air filled her ears together with the sound of her last scream.


	8. Interlude 4

**Interlude**

"Goodness, child! You're bleeding!"

Nancy's father was close to dropping the grocery bag, when she entered the kitchen. Her mother was standing pale and wide-eyed in a corner.

She looked uncomprehendingly from the one to the other. Then, she looked down herself. The left sleeve of her white sweater was drenched with blood, a large red blotch which was already beginning to darken and stiffen at the edges. She gasped with surprise; she hadn't even noticed it in her hurry away from the library.

Her father went to the bathroom to fetch the first-aid kit, while her mother was still standing stiff and mute, supporting herself against the kitchen table. Nancy removed her soaked sweater with an irritated expression on her face. How could she miss noticing so much blood? Now, she would have to make up a story.

She had been awakened by her own scream. Her heart had been racing insanely, threatening to break away from her chest. She had looked around with wide open eyes, breathing frantically, not believing that he was gone. But the library had been empty; there had been no people around. And no sound of children.

Jessie had come hurriedly, asking if she was alright. All she had managed was a faint nod. She had glanced at the clock on the library wall; she had only been slumbering for about five minutes. Still shaking, she had grabbed her bag, thanked Jessie for her help and hastened homeward.

This had been no game, nor any casual travel into dreamland. She had been fighting for her life.

After a thorough cleaning, four parallel bruises showed on her forearm. Only one of them was cut through and bleeding.

"It looks worse than it is," Nancy's father said, smiling comfortingly at her. He could sense her anxiety. "What have you been up to?"

Her eyes sought some sort of visual support on the wall of the kitchen and found it in the form of a framed drawing of a tree she had made long ago.

"Nothing. I was walking in the park," she said casually, trying to make it sound as convincing as possible, "…er…in the part with all the old thorn bushes, you know?"

"It looks more like the claws of a wild animal to me," he said, heaving an eyebrow.

Her mother left the kitchen, and they heard her lie down on the couch in the living room with a heavy sigh. It was probably her headache bothering her again.

Nancy lowered her eyes. She didn't know what to say.

"I'd better go and check on your mom," her father said, giving the bandages on her arm a final resolute tug.

Nancy allowed herself to relax a bit. Her hands were still shaking from the chock of her dream, and she rubbed them hard against her thighs to still them. The skin on her right knuckle looked red and swollen.

A hushed conversation issued from the living room. Nancy couldn't make out the words, but her mother sounded rather upset. It had been years since she had suffered from her migraine.

It had all started around the time the factory near Badham School had gone up in flames. Her mother had become worried and restless, starting to develop increasingly severe headaches which had made her irritable and sullen. Some days, Nancy and her father had to walk around on tiptoes in order not to disturb her, or she would throw a hysterical fit. Gradually, the distance between her and Nancy had grown into a vast abyss, their relationship a broken bridge between them. They had never really been able to repair it.

Her father had taken her mother in and out of hospitals and neurological clinics, but the doctors couldn't do anything – not even diagnose her. It had been a hard time for her father, Nancy realized now, taking care of a lonely child and a sick wife. Sometimes, she had found him alone crying, but he had always taken care to conceal his tears.

The attacks of migraine had subsided slowly after Nancy had started in high school, and since she had moved out, they had been practically absent.

Nancy looked at her hands again. Funny, how something invisible like a headache could affect the lives of a whole family… A shiver ran through her, and she checked on the bandages on her forearm. The wound had bled through a bit. She remembered the red spot the dream-furnace had left on Colin's face, and she jumped up.

She knew that the wall between dream and reality was thin, but not that it could be this fragile. Monica, Steven and the others hadn't died from some sort of weird coincidence between their dreams and real life; they had been killed _by_ their dreams. And if imaginary wounds could bleed through into the physical world…

Her legs became weak and shaky. She sat down again, feeling entirely exhausted and lost. The muttering sound of her parents talking in the living room seemed suddenly miles away, and the only thing surrounding her now was a vast bubble of unspeakable fear. She forced herself to think the thought, word by word, and she could feel drops of cold sweat breaking on her palms.

_Anything might come through…_


End file.
